A slightly tougher cycling environment

I have added another blog to my list - one about a 56 year old bloke who is serving in Iraq, and who rides his bike a lot.

I like this idea of drivers losing their job if they hit someone on a bike:

From my perspective, about half the bus drivers are South Asians who come from cultures with no tradition of chivalry. The traffic laws follow Darwin's rules. The bigger vehicle has the right of way. Bikes yield to everything. I dealt with this all over Asia. Here on base the bus drivers know if they hit a guy with ARMY across his chest they are gone and lose their job. But their instinct is to pull out in from of the little vehicle. So when they do it, I just keep pedaling. They back off, cursing me in whatever language they speak. But the more I do it, the less I have to do it. They get the idea that this is not Mumbai or Bangkok and buses do not have absolute right of way over bikes.

These mileage numbers are quite awe inspiring:

Before the other story, a milestones update:

As of today I have ridden almost 4000 miles this year including 2100 miles here in Iraq.

I don't have an exact number here, but I am now over 150,000 miles since I started riding seriously in 1986, the year I quit smoking. Of those miles, 75,000 are since January 1, 2000. If I go back to racing there is a good chance I will increase my total miles to 200,000 miles within the next 7 years.

He's been at it almost 20 years longer than I have, but he's done about 10 times the mileage I have. Must do more miles.